Yes, the Salvation Army actually went to Eurovision, and I don’t mean that they opened a store right next to the Euro Club. Yes, they actually sang on stage. The six Salvation Army members originally won the Swiss national final by the name “Heilsarmee” (German for “Salvation Army”). However, the EBU told them to change their group name due to avoid commercial/religious promotion, so it was changed to “Takasa” (Swahili for “purified”). This only resulted in bloggers joking that the group name stood for “The Artists Known as Salvation Army”.

If you listen to this song, the entry sounds like it’s still from the 80’s. Unfortunately, Europe wasn’t in the mood to vote for something at around 25-30 years old, so Josh Dubovie placed last (and was then put on BBC’s “Most Annoying People of 2010).

Before I started listening to Eurovision music, the only place I saw the word “Eurovision” was in the sleeve of my parents’ ABBA CD. And yes, winning Eurovision was their kick-start in becoming world-wide superstars in the 70’s and 80’s. Even though at the time, most songs were sung in countries’ native languages, there was a short window to enter songs in any language. ABBA took advantage of the offer, translated their song into English, won, and now it’s known all over the world.

Testing 123, testing 123? It is my first actual post (and not just hanging up a welcome sign).

While we’re waiting for news of where next year’s contest will be hosted (Copenhagen, Herning, Fredericia, or Horsens) and who will participate (Valentina for a 3rd time, anyone?), it’s time to look at some Eurovision flashbacks.

I’d like to apologise in advance to everyone who ranked Sweden first in 2011, because I wasn’t a fan of the song. It also didn’t really help that Eurovision occurred a few days after AP testing season, and that “popular” had the same amount of syllables as “calculus.” As a result, I had the song playing on the Ohrwurm Network playing for days and couldn’t stand the lyrics at the time. Although I’m still not a fan of the song, the tune is a good Ohrwurm/earworm that I can put up with while running. However, in order for me not to cringe at the lyrics, I can’t interpret them literally. The good thing is that it’s possible to look at the song from a different point of view, e.g. a historical perspective.
Before winning for a 5th time in 2012, Sweden underwent a short period in which their placement in the song contest sank lower and lower until failing to qualify for the final in 2010:

Given only the scores from these 6 years (bar Carola’s 5th place), it would seem nearly impossible for Sweden to win again. Despite the numbers looking pretty bad, Eric Saade managed to turn things around with a self-fulfilling prophesy.

“Stop, don’t say that it’s impossible, ‘cause I know it’s possible” =If you constantly think you’re going to fail, you are going to fail. It’s a self-fulfilling prophesy. So we’re going to think positive thoughts in order to let you think we’ll do better.”“Though I know you never look my way, I can say you will one day”= “Don’t just look at our bad scores these last few years, because we will win some time in the near future. And the Eurovision fans will come to Sweden when we host.”“I will be popular”= “Sweden will win the competition.”“My body wants you, girl”= Please give us lots of 12 points!

Sweden may not have won in 2011, placing 3rd behind Azerbaijan and Italy, but they won in 2012 with a record amount of douze pointe from 18 countries and newly-found morale picked up from the year before.